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Amazon’s New Pilot Hopefuls: Hit or Miss, With a Lot of Potential

Amazon has posted the pilots for its third round of potential series, the company making a concerted effort to join Netflix in the newfangled, so far pretty successful realm of original streaming series. None of the shows from the first round, including the political farce Alpha House and the Silicon Valley, um, satire Betas, gained all that much traction; the successes from the second round, including the Jeffrey Tambor-starring Transparent, have yet to debut their full seasons. But in the meantime here comes round three, laden with ambition.

There are five pilots up for contention—oh, right, Amazon’s decision is, supposedly, partly based on audience feedback—three comedies, two dramas. We spent yesterday watching all five, and found some shows worthwhile, others not so much.

Hand of God

Amazon

A dark moral thriller of sorts, Hand of God tells the sordid SoCal story of a corrupt, two-timing judge (Ron Perlman) who has a come-to-Jesus moment following a family tragedy and decides to become a vigilante for justice. Dana Delany plays his cool, co-conspiring wife, Garret Dillahunt is a similarly born-again convict, the slimy Julian Morris is a preacher man up to no good, and The Wire’s great Andre Royo is a business partner concerned about his associate’s new change of faith. The series, which Marc Forster executive produces, sets a nice scene, appropriately sun-baked and oppressive. I don’t quite buy Perlman as a judge, crooked or otherwise, but he’s a commanding presence nonetheless. Hand of God has style, and an interesting premise, so I hope it makes it past this elimination round.

Hysteria

Amazon

Would that I could say the same thing about the other drama, a medical mystery of sorts starring an oddly cast Mena Suvari and written by none other than Shaun Cassidy. Those familiar with news of the weird, or who have read Megan Abbott’s new novel, The Fever, will immediately recognize the setup of Hysteria: in Texas, a group of teenage girls are suddenly afflicted with uncontrollable tics and spasms, and nobody can figure out why. So a haunted doctor, played by Suvari, goes to investigate and deal with her own past issues. The pilot is dreary and never terribly plausible, especially when it addresses the unsettling implications of social media, a trope that needs to be handled very carefully or risk seeming hokey. Hysteria, sadly, does not avoid that trap.

Red Oaks

Amazon

An hour-long comedy, Red Oaks follows an 80s college student’s (downbeat, charming Oliver Cooper) summer spent working as an assistant tennis pro at a mostly Jewish New Jersey country club. He’s got a hot girlfriend with a wandering eye, a more interesting girl teasing him from afar, and a ragtag group of weirdo friends, including the requisite horndog oaf and an older, sleazy mentor type. Red Oaks hits a lot of the same notes that other recent coming-of-age tales have, but as directed by David Gordon Green, it has a grace and gentility to it that kept me invested. Based on Cooper’s charms and an interesting setting, despite too many well-worn 80s visual cliches, I’m into it. But if it remains as formulaic as the pilot, it could quickly get tiresome.

Really

Amazon

Speaking of formulaic! Creator-star Jay Chandrasekhar’s relationship comedy, about four sets of couples dealing with the sudden onset of adulthood, is basically the same show as a million recent failed network sitcoms. Affluent and mostly white (Chandrasekhar is the only person of color in the main cast), these are people we’ve already spent a lot of time with. So in that respect it’s boring. But at least the casting is good. Sarah Chalke, Selma Blair, Lindsay Sloane, Collette Wolfe, and Hayes MacArthur are all good, likable actors who do nice, easy-breezy work in the pilot. But the show largely coasts on their charm, with boring jokes clashing up against awkwardly rendered plotlines about blow jobs and alcoholism. Really doesn’t do much to justify its existence, beyond keeping a lot of good actors theoretically employed.

The Cosmopolitans

Amazon

In some ways the most high profile of the new series, Whit Stillman’s TV debut is about a group of expats living in Paris, sitting in cafes and going to parties and talking about things that Whit Stillman likes to talk about, in ways that Whit Stillman likes to talk about them. It’s my belief that Stillman’s stilted, preppy-bohemian, WASPish cadence is a love-it-or-hate-it proposition, and while I tend toward the latter, I think those who enjoy his work will get a kick out of this. I mean, it’s Adam Brody and Chloë Sevigny, among others, acting pretentious in beautiful Paris, gabbing about class and status and relationships on lovely old streets while sipping delicious wine. It’s definitely the most aesthetically pleasing of these fairly low-budget series. I just wish I personally liked it more. Ah well. C’est la vie.